2019 Hands-On Curatorial Program Exhibition

“Recollective Echo” Click here to read catalog.

When we started to discuss our exhibition we realized, the pieces at Ralph T Coe Center have a story to tell. As we acknowledge the object’s own history, we want to take it a step further. To add our own narrative. We want to share our stories and create new ones, adding to the already diverse collection of stories that are present in our world. Recollective Echo, to us, means remembering moments in time, stories and continuing to tell them so that they may go on to be repeated and influential in one’s life.   —Hands-On Curators

Above photo: 2019 Hands-On Curators left to right: Lesly Esparza (NMSA), Ashlyn Lovato (Santa Clara Pueblo), Veronica Silva (NMSA), Gailene Morgan (Meskwaki Nation & Tesuque Pueblo), Roan Mulholland (ATC), and Aurora Escobedo (Tesuque Pueblo).

Film: Aurora Escobedo in conjunction with the exhibition Recollective Echo.

In 2019, Ralph T. Coe Center for the Arts’ Hands-On Curatorial Program was in its fifth year working with high school students from the Academy of Technology and the Classics (ATC), the Santa Fe Indian School (SFIS), and the New Mexico School for the Arts (NMSA). Returning students Gailene Morgan (Meskwaki Nation & Tesuque Pueblo), Ashlyn Lovato (Santa Clara Pueblo), Aurora Escobedo (Tesuque Pueblo), and Roan Mulholland (ATC) are joined by new members, Lesly Esparza (NMSA) and Veronica Silva (NMSA).

The program provides an opportunity for students to work hands-on with the Coe collection of over 2,300 works of Indigenous art from around the world. Through museum visits and weekly sessions, the curators learn how to create their own exhibition from the Coe collection by selecting objects, researching and drafting wall texts, writing press releases, designing graphics and the exhibition layout, as well as creating their own limited-run curator-designed t-shirts in collaboration with YouthWorks. The participants build their own exhibition from the ground up!